We’ve also revisited some of our policies regarding how we handle potential in-game bugs and issues.

With the event occurring via LAN with players on-site, verifiable technical issues such as hardware failures or internet instability may result in a remake, depending on the impact and severity of the issue.

If an in-game bug or issue occurs that prevents a player from being able to continue play due to game physics, such as getting stuck in terrain, a remake will be called.

Issues that will not lead to a restart include: creatures evading or resetting, hitting the wrong target with spells or melee attacks, or buffs/debuffs being applied incorrectly.

With the MDI Global Finals starting this Friday (June 22), who are the top teams to watch from each region to watch and why?Obviously, you should be watching every team because these are the baddest dudes in the world. But some of these teams have a little extra narrative or a few quirks that you should pay attention to.

China

Skyline.D has been a unicorn of sorts in the tournament so far. When time trials started, Skyline.D jumped to the top of the leaderboards right out of the gate with a really unique triple melee comp (rogue, rogue, DH). Having two rogues enables a lot of really clever skips in certain dungeons, and Skyline.D’s time trial runs took full advantage of these.

Skyline.D did not drop a single map on its way to taking the top seed in the China region, so it enters this weekend as the top overall seed in the tournament. Unfortunately, one of its rogues, MMY, needed an emergency surgery earlier this week and will need to be replaced on short notice. This late roster change will make Skyline.D very unpredictable in the tournament.

APAC

If the MDI had championship belts, Free Marsy would be hoisting those belts over their heads as they take their seats this Friday. As the winners of the inaugural MDI, Free Marsy have the most tournament experience of any team in the finals. They took the top seed in the APAC region and look poised to make another run as MDI champs.

One thing to keep an eye on, though, is that Free Marsy’s healer in regionals, Xerase, wasn’t able to make the trip to Columbus and will be replaced by Sups. Everyone knows that the healer is easily the most important position on any M+ team, so this roster change could have big implications. Sups has broad shoulders, though, so don’t expect any drop off from the champs.

EU

Much love to my guys on Kjell’s Angels, but I’ve got to go with Method PogChamp here (unbiased, obviously). This crew sliced its way through the EU winner’s bracket before ultimately dropping its first series of the tournament in the regional finals against Kjell’s Angels. One underrated element of regionals was that weapon ilvl was set at 970 instead of the intended 995. This has been rectified in the global finals, and you can expect no team to make better use of this ilvl bump than PogChamp with its double caster lineup.

This team is as star-studded as any in the tournament, featuring stream darlings Drjay, Sjele and Muscle. I wouldn’t be surprised if this team has the most fans rooting for it in stream chat next weekend, and they stand a great chance at taking home gold.

Americas

I swear to Cenarius, if you aren’t watching me this weekend I’m gonna -- uh I mean, you should definitely check out Method NA because they have the biggest advantage of any team in the tournament: the power of friendship. And also unfettered access to the scoPhone.

Blizzard also posted an article highlighting the different teams:

Blizzard

Out of the 32 starting teams—eight apiece from the Americas, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and China—just two from each region are participating in the Mythic Dungeon Invitational Global Finals in Columbus, Ohio, beginning Friday, June 22 at 9:00 a.m. PDT. There is a $100,000 prize pool on the line and the top four finishers earn a spot in the MDI All-Stars exhibition at BlizzCon in November.

Witness the Birth of a DynastyTeams had six weeks to prepare for the finals by honing their skills, perfecting their routes, and studying their opponents. The reigning champions from the 2017 Mythic Dungeon Invitational, Free Marsy, are primed to repeat the events of last year’s triumph.Free Marsy swept through the APAC region undefeated, but weren’t the only team with a blemish-free record. Perfect regular seasons will be major psychological weapons for both Method NA and Skyline.D—who didn’t drop a map playing in China, but will have to overcome a major deficit in their completion times if they want to remain competitive.Since their healer couldn’t attend the event in Columbus, Free Marsy picked up Sups from Free Pumps. Sups stood out for his Restoration Druid “catweaving” skills, which nearly landed his team in the finals with Free Marsy. His reliable extra DPS may have been enough to clinch victory at the regionals, but Sups isn’t the only healer who’s proven himself to be a damage-dealing force. Method NA’s Jdotb, usually known for his top-level mage skills, crushed it as a Restoration Druid in his regional matches. Underdogs from AboveIt is no small feat to take out the top three seeded teams from your region. Kjell’s Angels became unlikely champions in the European regionals after defeating the favored Method EU and Raider.IO, and then holding off Method Pogchamp in their rematch at the EU finals.With the changes to the tournament format, Kjell’s Angels will have ample opportunity to prove themselves to be something more than a fluke, but rather burgeoning masters of their craft.Turn It Up to 25Changes to the format include increasing the key level by one for each round, putting the finals at +25, increasing mob health, and increasing damage dealt by enemies from 896% to 985%.Also, the third affix for each match is now set in advance, instead of being chosen by the losing team of the previous match in each series. To spice it up even more, affixes and map pools were shuffled, and previously excluded affixes were added to the available pool. Learn more about the MDI Global Finals and the latest news here, and then catch all of the MDI Global Finals action in English on the official Warcraft Twitch channel with additional languages also available.

Inspect Feature

If you head to the Warcraft Twitch Page and a match is in progress, you'll see a button on the video player called Inspect. Clicking on this will allow you to see everything about each of the 10 participants in the match including Class, Race, Gear, Spec and Talents!

These tooltips are powered by Wowhead and you can set up Wowhead tooltips for your own projects following this link.

What's Next?

At BlizzCon 2018, the top four teams from the Global Finals will try out Battle for Azeroth dungeons!

Blizzard

We’re excited to announce the Mythic Dungeon Invitational All-Stars, a special live exhibition tournament that summons some of the best dungeon-running teams from around the globe to BlizzCon 2018! We’re bringing the worlds of the MDI and the WoW Arena World Championship together in Anaheim for the first time ever, and WoW esports fans are in for a truly epic weekend.The top four teams from the MDI Global Finals will be invited to the MDI All-Stars, where they’ll tackle the newest Battle for Azeroth dungeons live on stage in front of thousands of attendees and esports fans watching online. This will be the first MDI tournament to feature Battle for Azeroth, so get ready for a whole new set of dungeons, bosses, and cunning strategies.If your favorite team doesn’t make it to the All-Stars event, don’t worry—this will just be the start of the MDI competition for the new expansion. After Battle for Azeroth launches later this year, we’ll share more information on our MDI plans, including the full schedule and format of the All-Stars event and how to compete in future events. Stay tuned!

Battle for Azeroth has some Mythic+ changes in store, including seasonal affixes like Infested and no gear swapping during the run.

Mythic+ Guides and Tips

Interested in getting into Mythic+? Check out our guides, written by top Mythic+ Players including some in the Global Finals:

Good > "With the event occurring via LAN with players on-site, verifiable technical issues such as hardware failures or internet instability may result in a remake, depending on the impact and severity of the issue."

Arguably the entire thing should be LAN from capital cities. Booking out a venue and signing a policy for internet malfunction shouldn't be so hard blizzard. If my university in Australia can give me locations all over the country to take exam tests for my online course, clearly you can give a LAN "option" in all capital cities so that, "verifiable technical issues" can be directly sent to blizzard and a remake can be granted if needed. Send an email to all players, "do you request for a LAN venue to be found in your area for the competition." If yes, book out a small venue in their capital city. Examples; private group rooms in internet cafes, etc. Allow the competitor to bring their PC if they want, etc. Give the option, so that you can give LAN policy. If the competitor doesn't take it, than it frees up your burden of "blizzard should !@#$ing do remakes for internet failing" throughout the competition.

Some nice changes all round, thank you for continuing to keep watch and adjust the esport. Hope we have many good years of watching to come :).

Comment by martinboy

on 2018-06-24T16:15:00-05:00

That DPS meter in the UI, is that Recount, Skada or something Blizzard developed?

Comment by blupache

on 2018-06-24T22:42:04-05:00

Not a fan of the fixed class version of MDI.

The meta is really optimised by this stage in every expac, and when you remove the opportunity to swap in niche specs you end up with a generalist according-to-meta team versus another generalist according-to-meta team.

Imagine if League let both teams choose any character & locked those characters between maps... it'd end up being the same handful of characters on each side for every match. And that's exactly what we're seeing in MDI with this fixed classes format. Changing up classes allows for more whacky niche strategies, and a much more interesting head-to-head.

Comment by hmaurice2

on 2018-06-24T23:59:29-05:00

It looks like skada with as much minimalization as possible. I use skada and it looks exactly the same.

1

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